An exploratory study of small business Internet commerce issues

Internet adoption by small business is important to the generation of criti cal mass for Internet commerce - governments in the G8 countries are settin g up initiatives to ensure that small businesses adopt Internet commerce. T his paper reports of a qualitative study into why small businesses are onli ne. The study found that the small business Internet commerce (SBIC) phenom enon is still in its infancy, although small businesses are finding e-mail useful for business communication and document transfer; the perception of long-term benefits and potential business opportunities is what is driving SBIC; at present, the uptake of Internet-based financial transactions is st ill slow; there is almost no integration between the Internet and internal applications; and, finally, that SBIC seems likely to continue to expand in this sector of market only if small firms actually experience tangible ben efits in the future. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.